YEAH, I KNOW IT'S BEEN A WHILE...
...in fact, this is the longest blogging hiatus I've ever taken...
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Maybe this happens to all bloggers everywhere. The Blog-drums. I just haven't felt all that resourceful or creative. But since it's been three weeks, after all, you'd think I could find something to write about. So here I go...
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THE I.R.S. TOLD ME NOT TO FILE: Somehow, I lost my 2011 tax information. April 15th went past, and still I hadn't sent anything in. So I mailed in my Form 1099, along with a message that said, "I've received no refunds in the last few years and as far as I know, that continues to be the case. A couple weeks after that, I got a notice that I should contact the Friendly I.R.S. folks sometime soon. So I accessed their 800 number, and told the lady at the other end about my circumstances. We went through a few questions/answers. I told her I hadn't filed, and she looked up my taxable income, and said I hadn't made enough to require any submission from me. I asked her, "are you telling me not to send anything in?", to which she replied, "we actually prefer that you don't because it means more paperwork; look up your figures in next year's tax instructions and don't send in anything if the tax tables tell you not to." So how about that. The I.R.S. told me to NOT to file. I bet you don't hear that every day. I know I don't.

WHAT'S UP, DOC?: I got bounced to another doctor when my original physician packed up his old kick bags and left with a smile. The new doctor is a little hard to get used to...he's originally from Nepal, and although he speaks English fairly well, his words come out all crammed together in a very blusterous manner. I don't hold anything at all against foreigners who come to this great nation of ours to seek their dreams; it's just that he's from somewhere else other than America, and I'm having to get used to the way he communicates. Maybe he knows he's difficult to understand, because he gives his patients a written summary of everything they've been told, which probably helps in this case. But then again, I think he knows what he's doing after all. I had to give 5 vials of blood during my visit to the Vampire corner of the medical center. He's checking all kinds of things including my thyroid. I have been feeling very tired lately. And I'm hoping he'll have me on a course of treatment that'll give me the Zip and Zest of a teenager. As if that's going to happen anytime soon.
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STRANGE BEDFELLOWS DEPARTMENT: How did 1940's crooner Jerry Vale and late '60s drug band Moby Grape end up on the same side of a record? Both artists are as different as Night and Day, after all. I think Jerry Vale might actually have sung "Night And Day", the old Cole Porter song, way back whenever...

Columbia Records has been around forever. It grew into a very, very large record company with hundreds of artists. Not only did they release 'regular-issue' records, they issued lots of special-issue records; for example, I have an LP featuring many different artists, on the 'Columbia Special Products label with such artists as Tony Bennett, The New Christy Minstrels, Eydie and other middle-of-the-road performers. The record came out in the early '60s.

By the late l960's, however, things weren't as squeaky clean. After all, it was the Age of the Hippie, all wearing flowers in their hair. Oh to have been there. Anyway...Columbia put out this special pressing, a 7" album, with 2 songs per side. "Great Contemporary Music" they called it, and was issued for Crest Toothpaste. On side two of the record, Moby Grape was indeed contemporary at the time, but Jerry Vale hadn't been contemporary since the late 1940's, sustaining himself thru the years by singing Muzak versions of other artists' hits. Don't get me wrong; I like Jerry Vale, but anyone 'in the know' in the late 1960's knew Mr. Vale was about as contemporary as typewriter ribbons are nowadays. Maybe Moby Grape planned it that way: "Hey, let's get the record company to put a Jerry Vale song in front of ours, that way we'll sound Really Shocking!" In my opinion, going from Jerry Vale headlong into Moby Grape is an example of Musical Whiplash.
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So I'll end things here, and maybe I can work up the urge to blog again in another three weeks (?). Basically, I wanted to tell both of my faithful readers that yes, I'm still alive.